A passage for India

If one was to go by the dimensions of the “eye of the needle”, one wonders if any camel ever passed through it. As for heaven, it is possible that some rich men might have greased their way. Surely, only the blessed know if everything is on the house, heaven runs on a certain type of economic system. About hell, there is little doubt. The bars, the poker players, the dancers must be generating substantial revenues. It’s a question of theology I am not well-equipped to answer. Is hell, with smooth revenues, better than heaven, where every good is available, but on ration. As it comes out, today the definition of “hell” and “heaven” probably depends on that with uninterrupted revenues, vis-a-vis, one that is in persistent deficit. Derived from a sermon from a holy book, the transgression if any, be pardoned.

The world’s oldest civilization, today the world’s largest democracy by numbers, is perhaps realigning itself with the neo-economics of today’s world. India may have been impoverished during the imperial rule, but did pick up on technology, administration, and systems of running a government. To grapple with the tenets of democracy, in a land suddenly turned communal on a religion-based partition, the very ingredients of constitutional guarantees, actually were skewed conveniently to energize the electoral system. An oriental, segmented society was rightfully equalized by affirmative action, but electoral sentiments were overdone at the expense of merit, which is not the same as freedom of opportunity. That freedom should normally not be at the cost of merit. On the same weaknesses, the leftovers of communal thought were to be nurtured as a convenient trunk full of votes. The disadvantages worked both ways. The leaders chose and played with the electorate to their convenience. The electorate, in turn, installed half-baked leaders as per the divisions from which it voted. Indian politics, slowly began to succumb to this vicious circle to lower and lower ebbs.

Globalization came as a wake-up call, two decades and a half back. Subsequent governments were aware, and acted as per circumstances and what was feasible.

It would be unfair to blame or appreciate any particular government. They all did their best, but part time globalization was only the minimal that was done.

The new passage that this nation has today, is the buzzword “development”. Given the resources, opportunities, throwing up new challenges before the entrepreneurs had to be made a full time national obsession. This takes away all class and community barriers for people to align, toil by choosing their best alliances, because now the balance sheets and outputs are important. The ideals are lofty, the ground path not so smooth. Here lie the slog overs of this great match for further economic freedom.

To be honest, but for the socialist infrastructure in the first two decades after partition, politics was so stuck that nothing substantial was added except buying more and more weapons. Natural resources as cultivable land, irrigation, power, coal, mining, remained largely untapped.

India, today, gets another chance to enhance its economic independence in the wake of a new world order, where it is seriously realized that this land needs to perform better for itself and the rest of the world. The world scene somehow becomes yet another mega opportunity for the nation to uplift itself from the “developing” to a “developed” status.

There is a new strategy that has come into play. For once we are seriously looking out for alliances and mergers, and fortunately quite a few business houses are geared up. With the vast Indian diaspora, and sufficient Indians knowing the basic mathematics, a lot will come easy, some more with foreign mediators (Sun-Daichii, for instance), and a section may be an unequal give and take, that is part of the business.

Foreign major players in India today are the US, Japan, the UK, Germany, S Korea, France and Italy. Russia figures as a major in armaments due to traditional ties. India’s strengths are software, pharmaceuticals, skilled manpower. Sun-Daichii was a great experiment in creating a true Indian MNC of a substantial scale. There could be few more, to cover substantial segments of the world’s generic market. TCS, is among the biggest software providers, but Infosys under an American-Indian would certainly be looking for amalgamation, to widen its global base, as well as go full throttle to make a true Indian software product of the likes of Microsoft, or at least start moving in that direction. The opening of major defence production with foreign alliance, boosts the economy and increases employment, but one would wish that there be less need to produce armament for everyone’s good.

To my mind, if the government has to put half its treasury in one place, it should go to apex R&D in solar energy and alternative fuels. Once the equation of tapping loads of sunlight on the area of a serving dish is cracked (no harm if the dish cracks too), perhaps half our woes are gone.

Private health sector needs investments to expand within and without the land. This along with affordable medicines is a synergy. Some of this could fit in Obamacare if it gets a revival, or else most of Africa, Middle East, Eastern Europe, even the West where tariffs are unaffordable.

Peace in the neighbourhood needs to be put in place as soon as possible. But for political pledges played over decades, the common man understands that peace and proactive trade and interaction now take the first place, and for the rest no one is a loser or gainer.

There are purported announcements of further reforms this Independence Day. Let us see how far they go, till the next announcement.

We need sufficient understanding between the ruling party and the opposition. Where there is a national gain, the opposition can only notch up their popularity by a graceful “aye”. On other occasions it may force a deal. Somehow, this time the Upper House seems to be the real one!

India’s strategic gain is not so much because we have coherently been practical. It is just that the geopolitical epicentre has shifted somewhere around, as does a new world economic order that stoops to conquer!

Happy Independence Day!

DISCLAIMER : Views expressed above are the author's own.

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Author

Anoop Kohli is a senior consultant neurologist at the Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, New Delhi. His interests go far beyond his chosen profession. For him, it's just one game of life so interesting to study for all its themes and aberrations. He also dabbles in script-writing and recently got a membership of the Bombay Film Writers' Association. In this blog, Masquerader, expect from him anything from H1N1 to Heena.